a leaf with no destination (sequel to soaking me as deeply)
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: It's autumn and in a tree-lined avenue, Hikaru walks silently behind Akira.


Fandom: Hikaru no Go  
Title: a leaf with no destination. (sequel to "soaking me as deeply.")  
Pairing: Akira + Hikaru  
Rating: pg-13  
Description: It's autumn and in a tree-lined avenue, Hikaru walks silently behind Akira.

**Disclaimer: Hikaru no Go and ****"****Simple and Clean****" ****aren****'****t mine.**

In a picturesque world, would this scene be any different? Are my eyes really deceiving me because I think I'm dreaming?  
As the fall wants to change into winter, I can't believe we're walking together. Side by side, we're going down the path filled with so many leaves that I don't know where to start counting just to avoid watching him so avidly that I'll forget all discretion.

He walks ahead of me with that stern look of his and I never know what he thinks of me. He always shouts at me, but when he's quiet like this, I worry more about what he's thinking about. Is it all right for him to be quiet?

Do I have to fill in all the silences that are in between us?

But it makes me so sad because I feel our gap is getting wider as the years go by. No matter what I do, I don't know if he's looking back anymore.

Will there be a day when he won't look behind him to see if I'm there?

I used to be much better than this. I used to rush into things and talk without thinking very much about what I wanted, pretending to be confident. I was punky to hide my shame of not knowing what to do with myself.

And now that I know what I want and where I want to go, now that I'm getting to the place where I want to be, why can't I ever get there? Why does it seem like I'll never reach that destination?

Akira, what have you done to me? Why are you in front of me right now but you're walking so much farther and you don't know what you're doing, driving me crazy with your "indifference" to me?

The wind becomes colder, wanting to freeze me into eternity in the place where I'm standing,  
and you're just walking away from me without a glance…

When will I start not existing in your world?

**a leaf with no destination.  
By miyamoto yui  
(sequel to ****"****soaking me as deeply.****"****)**

I haven't regretted anything in my life, but if I could change things so that I could be with you now,  
I'd probably do everything that I can. But why can't I do it now? How come I'm stopping myself?

There are many things you don't know or want to know about me. But is that such a selfish statement? Maybe. Maybe not. It is based on my fears and nothing else. And yet, I find myself wanting to reach out for you even though I know that it is close to impossible.

I can't hold you and I can't touch you. Even in my wildest dreams, you are just standing next to me and I want to embrace you as if I'm suffocating, to make you see a glimpse of what I feel about you. But is this too romantic? Is this not in character? I guess there are people that change and fall very hard once they meet the person that they fall in love with.

So what I am going to do about it?

I want to go after you, but will you respond to me? And if you do? I will be faced with the decision of running away. Always so scared to get so close to someone, I find that I am more scared of success than failure. So, I brush off whatever I'm thinking and feeling and pass it off as if I don't care at all for anyone or anything. I act aloof.  
I am in familiar territory if I fail and that's why I don't mind "failing" and seeing that it doesn't work out.

If I have to give more effort than I can possibly give, will it ever be enough?

It doesn't seem so. As I look at your back, everything points to this being so true.

Even now, as I stand so far away from you, I feel so insufficient. And then, you're just smiling at me with all that you can and then I can't do anything. Nothing at all. That catches me off-guard.

The rain may fall and the sun may sunshine in the sky, but here I am still trying to search for you in this turbulent weather inside of me.  
I keep on trying my best to breathe as I drown in this ocean of dreams and feelings with the weight of the water trying to crush me. The waves have no mercy and I sometimes want to give up, but when I see you smiling on the shore shouting for me, wanting to come and get me but I won't allow you to do anything for me when I want to do everything for you.  
But then you'll feel unneeded when it's you that I need the most in the world.

I'm very good at hiding things like this.

I have to let these feelings out because you are the reason that I'm still here and holding on. When I think of you, I can go on. I can do anything. I can stand any kind of pain, a fool who doesn't know real pain when I've got it dripping from every pore on my body including my heart.

When I lost that tournament…  
When Sai went away…  
When you looked at me with disappointment when I played as "myself"…

I keep on singing to you with my silent words trying to touch you. I wonder if they ever reach you. I wonder if they ever will.

If only things could be as easy as when I place a go chip on the board with such confidence and arrogance.

But the strength of these feelings will continue and they might grasp you unconsciously. I wonder if you dream about me as I want to dream about you. Do you daydream as I've found myself to do? I never did that before, but now I find that I can do nothing but kill myself inside by smiling in my silence as I laugh that there are many things to do because I want to distract myself so that I won't have to deal with my feelings for you.

Can't you see that when you're far away, I can't function without you? I'm just going about my business pretending as if I know. I keep on going around the city and wander as if I have a purpose when all I want to do is work and come home to you, my home, at the end of a day.  
I want to share your thoughts, your eyes, your words with the rest of the world. I want to share the winters that freeze me from the inside, but your warmth catches me even from so far away. I wonder if I ever had you alone if that would mean anything?

Is this what we call fate? Is this what we call destiny?

If we did, then we could have done something about it?

There was once someone that tried to sway me away from these feelings because I was so mixed up, but now I realize that there is nothing else that I can do but think of you in that white snow, pure as silk on a bed.

The most important thing in the world is right in front of me but I can't reach out. I'm trying so hard, but it doesn't get me anywhere. What can I do? How did this happen? I got so far and I can't go against everything after all. I'm faced with my own mortality.

What is there to fight for? Why do I have to fight against everything to get to you?

It's not fair that there are people who don't have this problem. But then again, there are people who will never experience this as I have for someone. We are all pitiful in some way, aren't we?

I laugh. I finally see you turn your head to smile at me with all these things coming to my head. I watch you trying to catch a maple leaf because you think that it's fun. It's something you want to feel at that very moment even though you can't say anything to me. In times like these, you look so reserved even though I know you want to act like a child, wild and free, and not the way you've been taught to act..

In the next moment, you instead bend down to pick up the leaf that just escaped you just now. It looks poetic in a way.

Even though I feel binded by emotions, I still want to be free!

I look at the leaf that slipped by you.  
Like me, it flowed with the wind,  
wanting to held like that by you, in your wonderful, worn fingers.

I am a leaf with no destination.

All I know is that autumn has come and I can't cling to the tree that I've been trying to hold onto all this time. This love that has been my foundation will go through the harsh winter. The snow will come.

And what will happen with time?

As inconsistent as the moon or the years may be, I know how I am.

I will change,  
but my feelings will stay the same. As always.  
They'll just grow deeper roots.

Year after year, becoming more beautiful in the spring;  
dying more elegantly in the autumn.

And for me,  
you won't age at all.

You'll always be the same as in my memory.

But I know people must change and their feelings will change too.  
That's what I fear most of all.

It's not that I don't trust you…  
…it's that time and circumstances can make you do some strange things.

And more than anything, if you left me alone, I'll be sure to come back to kill myself over and over looking for you…

…or I'll hopelessly wait for your return.

That's just how it is. That's just how much I can't tell you,

of how much you mean to me.

Will I always stare at you from the back, Akira?

I walk a little faster to catch up to him. I blink and suddenly blurt out before I can take my words back, "But I'm not like you, Akira."  
"Huh?" He glances back at me.  
I don't know if he's surprised that I'm calling him by his first name or at what I've just said.

I close my eyes and kiss him under the falling leaves.

Under all the scrutinizing eyes of people in the past, the present, and the future, I openly declare what I can't stand hiding anymore.

I open my eyes to find him still shocked and then he closes his eyes slowly. He tightly grabs the sleeves of my white turtleneck in between his fingers. I won't allow him to pull away from me.

I'm not like you because I have to say what I have to, even though I know you'll keep quiet. And because of that, regardless of whether or not you feel the same, I have to tell you after all these years.

You know why? I realized it as I looked at you picking up that forgotten leaf. You depend on me to understand you unlike anyone else. I've always been with you, haven't I? As for me, a long time ago, I did find something to fight for…

…and that was you.

Even though you thought it was against you, especially in Go.

Running my fingers into his long hair, I touch his forehead with mine. Smiling, I then lean forward, almost touching my lips to his left ear. I close my eyes and sing into his ear,

"When we are older you'll understand. It's enough when I say so.  
And maybe, some things are that simple."

When I open my eyes, the prideful Akira has tears in his. He shakes his head. I don't know what he's reacting to. Is it because of the song he sang thinking I wasn't listening? Is it because of all the things he could never express to anyone or about his true feelings? Is it like all the stuff that's been holding me back?

"You always say things so easily. I sometimes wish…" Then, he stops explaining. He wants to fight back the tears, wanting to show no one how or what he cries for. "No, it isn't that simple."

"Yes, it is. It has to be!" I assure him as much as I can as I hold onto him with all that I have.

I'm trying to convince myself that this is true as I look at the long paved road in front of us. "We'll pretend it is."

I close my eyes and warmly kiss him again with the coldness of the evening setting in. And I could feel that the leaves scattering around us.

Because you can't speak up, I'll be the one to shout out the words for you.

**Owari. / The End.**

**Author****'****s note:** I had made this a few weeks ago for my own perusal. It was supposed to be for an original fiction piece, but the more I looked at it, I was going to adapt it for Akira. Then, I thought that I wrote so much from Akira's POV (which I hoped was accurate) and decided to change it a bit and put it through Hikaru.  
It seems OC, but I thought Hikaru would grow up and mature through his interaction with Akira. And I couldn't leave that last fic with a sad ending. Ack, I'm such an optimist.

Ah, what I'd do for a Sakura Itsuki doujnshi you don't want to know. *hearts*

**September 30, 2004, 4:59 AM**


End file.
